


Touch

by keep_waking_up



Series: Wincest Daemon AU [1]
Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-30
Updated: 2016-03-30
Packaged: 2018-05-30 01:55:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6403903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keep_waking_up/pseuds/keep_waking_up
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam was eight the first time he’d touched Celandia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Touch

**Author's Note:**

  * For [canonisrelative](https://archiveofourown.org/users/canonisrelative/gifts).



> Combination of the prompts “daemon AU” and “They let themselves start this because they knew they could quit anytime, but now, X years later…” for canonisrelative for spnspringfling 2016.

Sam was eight the first time he’d touched Celandia. He was eight and he’d just found out that monsters were real—everything was real. He was eight and he’d woken up screaming from the sort of nightmare that lurked even when the lights were on. Eight years old, and he’d scrambled into Dean’s bed hysterical and nothing Dean could say would calm him down. Finally, almost reeking of desperation, Dean had shoved Cela into Sam’s arms. “Here, see,” Dean’d said, before either of them could register what he’d done, “I’m here, I’m real.”

Sam had held Cela in his arms, held his brother’s soul in his arms, and he’d finally quieted. He’d felt his own daemon, Aesina, pressed up against his side, and between the two of them, he’d finally felt comforted. Safe.

Dean had still been shaking a bit when Sam let Cela go. Sam had taken one good look at his brother and handed Aesina over.

That was how it started.

 

*

 

Sam doesn’t think Dean would have started the whole thing if he’d realized they wouldn’t be able to stop. Sure, touching someone else’s daemon isn’t nearly as taboo as it had been fifty or sixty years ago. But it’s still something reserved primarily for lovers, or children too young to know better. Two brothers, both in their teens? If anyone ever catches them at it, Sam’s not sure what will happen. He just knows it wouldn’t be good.

They try, they honestly do. But whenever Cela brushes up against him or lays her head in his lap, Sam feels so safe, so loved, that it’s impossible to do anything but lean into it. At sixteen, he spends most of his time feeling stretched and thin, like anyone could just reach over and tear him to pieces. There’s not enough _him_ to contain everything he feels, all his hatred, anger, and fear. Aesina helps, but Cela helps more.

If it weren’t for Cela, Sam wouldn’t know that Dean loves him with the same crazed intensity that he loves Dean. And he doesn’t know what he would do, if he didn’t have the reassurance that he and Dean are ultimately the same in this.

 

*

 

Their father’s home right now, so Cela and Aesina are more circumspect than usual. Aesina still hasn’t settled, so it’s easier for her. If she wants to touch Dean, all she has to do is shift into something small and burrow between his shirt and his skin. Throughout the day, Sam feels those occasional touches, making something sing in the heart of him. Every time he looks over, Dean is looking back at him.

Cela’s settled, though, and she’s not small. Smaller than their father’s wolf, sure, but African wild dogs aren’t exactly petite either. She waits until their dad is out of the room before pressing up against Sam hurriedly, like there’s not enough time to make him feel everything she wants him to feel. As soon as their dad comes back, she’s on the other side of the room, laying over Dean’s feet and staring at Sam.

Luckily, at night they share a room.

“We’ve got to stop this,” Dean tells him, hushed, their mouths close enough together that it feels like Dean is breathing the words into him. Cela and Aesina are squished in between them, both touching both. Sam feels so full he can barely breathe. 

“It’s getting ridiculous,” Dean continues, and there’s an undercurrent of distress. Dean was the one to start this; Dean is the one who feels guilty about it. “Aesina barely goes an hour without—Sam, I thought you wanted to be _normal_.”

He does, in every way but this. He grabs onto Dean’s arm, fingers digging into the skin. “I’d miss it. If Cela stopped. If _you_ stopped. It’s the only thing that makes me feel…” Even in the dark, even to Dean, he can’t say it. Dean and Cela, they’re solid. Real. Not like Sam and Aesina. They’re something else.

Dean’s arm settles across all three of them: Aesina, Cela, and Sam, from left to right. “If you need it, then…” Dean trails off, but Sam can sense his relief. Dean will do what’s best for Sam; if it’s also what Dean wants, all that much better.

“I need it,” Sam affirms, and curls up until their daemons are caught even closer between them and his forehead brushes Dean’s. Heat blooms across his cheeks as Dean’s lips almost touch his. “I’ll always need it.”

 

*

 

Sam looks at girls occasionally. Dean looks at them more often, and does more than just look. Cela, though. She’s totally uninterested. Dean comes home one evening, radiating anger. “At least _try_ , Cela,” he’s saying as Sam runs down the stairs to greet him. When Dean sees him, he scowls, not because of Sam, just because he wants to share his distemper.

“What happened?” Sam asks, as Aesina—currently a mink—winds herself around Dean’s neck.

“Cela”—Dean directs an irritable look down at his daemon—“wouldn’t play ball with the girl’s daemon. Just completely blew him off. And the chick, she was totally down to go back with me to her place until then. Then she got all offended, said I couldn’t be that interested if Cela was acting like _that_.” He blows out a puff of angry air, and only calms a little when Aesina rubs her face against his cheek. “The only daemon Cela ever expresses any interest in is _Aesina_.”

He shouldn’t have said that. They both know it as soon as it comes out of Dean’s mouth. It’s always been clear that their daemons are just as wrapped up in each other as Dean and Sam are. But when Dean puts it like that, all of a sudden everything is shifted just slightly to the left. Cela never pays attention to daemons, but Cela pays attention to Aesina. And she’d never get near anyone else, but she touches Sam.

“Aesina,” Sam croaks out, and she moves from where she is frozen around Dean’s neck to fly over to Sam. Her new feathers brush against his throat. He stares at Dean. The planes of his face, the graceful slope of his throat, have never looked quite the same before.

Dean’s gaze is burning a hole in the ground, like it would be too much to look at Sam. “Forget it, Sam,” he barks out. “I didn’t mean—it doesn’t mean anything. We’re going to forget it.” He storms back out of the house the same way he came in, Cela close at his heels.

Aesina croaks out a long, mournful sound when he’s gone. Sam clutches her in his arms. “He shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t have done that,” he mutters down to her, getting a little hysterical. “He never should have left me touch Cela.”

She transforms once more, this time into a sleek fishing cat, and pushes her muzzle up into his chin. “What are we going to do?” she asks, her voice small. “We can’t _stop_.”

Sam knows she’s right.

 

*

 

They try. The four of them move awkwardly around each other, the magnets that once drew them together now repelling instead. But Sam wakes up gasping from dreams where Cela is just out of sight and Aesina’s constantly small now, as if she’s just hoping for a chance to crawl into Dean’s pocket. Sam feels shredded and lonely, and even when Aesina shifts one night to mirror Cela, she doesn’t feel entirely right in his arms. It’s as if he’s forgotten how to hold Aesina without Cela there beside her. The two of them, supposedly one self-contained unit, no longer know how to function alone.

It finally gets to the point where Sam feels like an addict, craving pushing him out of his skin. He watches Cela with hungry eyes and watches her watching him back. He can’t reach out and touch her—would never touch her without her touching him first—but he thinks about how medieval Europeans believed that creatures could see because they had feelers attached to their eyes that relayed the information back as sight. The people then tried to avoid even looking at other people’s daemons, since that sight-bringing touch would also be a violation. Sam wishes he could touch with his eyes. He and Cela would have already touched a million times over.

Even to Sam’s surprise, it’s Aesina who cracks. Their dad is gone two minutes before Aesina is running over to Dean’s side, preparing to clamber into his lap. Sam sucks in a breath when Dean shoves himself away. “No, Aesina,” Dean says, and his voice is rough and low like their father’s when he gives orders.

One paw already lifted, Aesina pauses at the end of the couch. “But we need it,” she tells Dean lowly. Sam hurts with the truth in her cracked little voice. “We need it. You said it was okay if we need it.”

Sam knows his brother. He can’t imagine Dean saying no to something he needs.

Dean says, “ _No._ ” Something permanently shatters inside Sam’s chest, in the same place he used to feel Cela.

“Dean,” Cela whispers, but Sam doesn’t hear the rest. He and Aesina have already left the room, running upstairs to slam the bedroom door closed behind them. Aesina leaps into his arms and the two of them shudder together, two wolves permanently separated from the rest of the pack.

A year later, Sam leaves for Stanford.

 

*

 

Four years later, Sam fights off an intruder who’s snuck into his apartment. It’s only when he sees Aesina’s striped paws pinning an African wild dog that he understands who he’s fighting with. “Dean?” he asks, equal parts hopeful and coldly horrified.

“Easy,” Dean pauses to look over at Aesina, “tiger, apparently.”

Dean’s laying on top of him and every part of Sam is warm where they’re pressed together. There’s barely a foot between Dean and Aesina. From Sam’s angle, it almost looks like they’re touching.

His chest begins to ache again.

 

*

 

“ _Dad’s on a hunting trip and he hasn’t been home in a few days._ ”


End file.
